…read ‘O’ and not comment on articles like the one in the August issue by beauty director, Valerie Monroe. This is not an easy issue to tackle. Women with low self-esteem in a weak area will take criticism especially hard in that area, while criticism in one of their more confident areas rolls right off their back. Monroe ultimately advocates the gentle approach (”Will you tell me if I ever am wearing too much eyeshadow?) hoping — a delightfully, non-action oriented approach to any situation–that your friend will, in turn, make a reciprocal comment. The word ‘hope’ can be as dis-empowering a word as ‘try’. Either do something or don’t. Hoping or trying don’t usually get you too far, especially in furthering friendships.
The answer to become more confident in all areas of your life by building your self-esteem and also by growing an authentic support team. 
If honesty is something that you do value in your relationships, then a friend’s comment–assuming that she is a good support team person for you and speaking out of love– won’t really bother you. You’ll know that she is not criticizing you as a person or trying to sabotage you, that she is speaking her truth because she cares about you. And that’s it. You don’t need to change your style, haircolor or make-up unless you want to. Take what you want and leave the rest. You might find yourself wishing that someone had enlightened you earlier. Honesty is a rare gift. Those who speak it are rare indeed.
Pamela Rogers, 29, was sentenced to seven years in prison Friday on charges that she had sent explicit photos to a young teen, formerly her student, while already on probation for having intercourse and oral sex with him. Rogers, who had been in jail since April, was led from the court sobbing and apologetic. Evidence was presented in the case by a clinical psychologist that said that the Rogers was a sex addict while Rogers’ mother asked the judge for leniency for her daughter based on the fact that her former husband was verbally, emotionally and mentally abusive to her, saying that “No one would have done that if they were of a normal mind,”. Based on her behavior, I’m not sure that I agree that Rogers doesn’t have a ‘normal mind’ but she does have a serious self-esteem problem which resulted in her acting in a sexually deviant way with an underage teen.
Sex addiction is often the result of low self-esteem. When we bury emotions that are troubling us, tolerate situations where we feel debased (such as an abusive relationship), or compromise our values for someone or something, we are lowering our self-esteem. With a lowered self-esteem, we often act in ways that are detrimental to ourselves and others such as abusing alcohol or drugs or engaging in unsafe and/or inappropriate sexual behavior. And low self-esteem can certainly be a by-product of an abusive relationship by a spouse.
I don’t know whether or not Rogers has a sex addiction. But I do believe that in a world where it is permissible for old men to take brides 40 years their junior, Rogers’ act hardly seems to merit a seven-year prison term. Her actions were certainly wrong. But what she needs is rehabilitation, which she is unlikely to get in prison, instead of the temporary Band-Aid of hard time.
In both Awaken Your Passion and Uncommon Confidence, participants hear the stress that I place on the importance of the right support team. There are varied reasons for this–none of which is an less important than another. A brief piece in the Sunday NYT Magazine, Confidant Crisis, by Ann Hulbert lends further reinforcement about some of my own findings about support team.
Despite the fact that we are more wired in, more connected to others than ever before, Americans have fewer close friends than they did even 20 years ago. This is not surprising given the fact that sheer ability to reach people does not a confidante make. More disturbing however, was the decline in the percentage of us–from 80% to 57% (a considerable drop)–who name a non-family person as part of that inner circle, Hurlbert tells us citing a 2004 General Social Survey. What does it mean? Well, it means that when we do turn to someone to share our inner angst or even special successes, we are turning to a family member instead of a best friend. While this doesn’t sound like regression, it certainly can be. Family members are not usually the best people to turn to champion our Authentic Self. They are too overly invested in our security and too closely tied to us emotionally. If you are turning to family members for support about your decision to sell your house, chances are, they aren’t going to be able to give you this support because they can only see the risk, the lack of a solid base & safety NOT the freedom from a mortgage or the world of possibilities that you imagine.
Hurlbert’s article raises some thought-provoking ideas. How do we define ‘confidante’? What importance are we placing on a support team? Are we authentically connecting with others? The article provides good food for thought for each of us as we consider our own relationships.
Somehow, even though I read a stack of periodicals, I come across few articles for women about sexuality that aren’t ridiculously over the top. We may be interested in the newest position that was just discovered but deeper than that, we want to hear how couples are dealing with the sexual aspect of their relationship. Many are just ignoring it, from what I am hearing. So, Intimacy and Ectasy featured in the August issue of Yoga Journal by Lorie Parch is a welcome breath of fresh air. Parch explores how yoga can improve your level of satisfaction with your sex life. Gaining authentic satisfaction from something in our lives will of course raise our self-esteem. The article can’t be found online yet but it is well worth checking out.
The July 10 issue of Fortune features a terrific article, The CEO Workout by Cait Murphy, which examines Corporate Athlete Program- a fitness, diet and energy awareness course to which companies send their employees on how to manage their energy. Managing energy, founder Jim Loehr tells attendees, allows us to become more “fully engaged” both in our personal as well as our professional lives. This, of course, makes perfect sense.
After attending a workshop last week,(one of whose objectives was to illustrate the link between emotions and physical health) I realized that there were even fewer people that I had imagined who understood the revelevance of this connection to their own life. People who aren’t aware how their bottled up emotions, poor diet and lack of physical fitness connects to their personal level of satisfaction and happiness are in for a real shock. Loehr’s program get right to this point, even if it is under the guise of ‘energy management’. By working with nutritionists, fitness experts and Loehr, Corporate Athlete Program attendees get the connection and how it can tie to their own satisfaction and thus, their company’s bottomline. Their own satisfaction level also impacts their self-esteem. Another great side benefit for executives to the $3750 committment that their company makes for them.
A recent article in The New York Times Sunday magazine explored the recent research on treating addiction and alcoholism with medication. The article was interesting as the debate is a hot one–do we treat addicts and alcoholics with another drug? Unsurprisingly, 12-step advocates (article author Benoit Denizet-Lewis speaks with John Schwarzlose, president of the Betty Ford Center) are against the idea, “…the fact is that today 12-step treatment is still the best treatment there is…”. A success rate of 5% (AA’s claimed success rate) is not terribly convincing nor would I consider it ‘the best treatment there is’, however knowing as I do how dis-empowering 12-step programs can be for many. Unfortunately, there are few alternatives to 12-step programs available. Hence, the interest in a drug which could kick the addiction habit.
Most conversations around addiction don’t seem to touch on the self-esteem factor and so I was impressed that Denizet-Lewis concludes the article with an excerpt by William C. Moyers speaking at a MIT conference to scientists and addict researchers. Moyers couldn’t have hit the nail on the head anymore powerfully when he said, “I have an illness with origins in the brain…but I also suffered with the other component of this illness. I was born with what I like to call a hole in my soul…A pain that came from the reality that I just wasn’t good enough. That I wasn’t deserving enough…that maybe you didn’t like me enough.” His point is an essential one that must be considered when treating addiction but which unfortunately seldom is. Moyers’ comments are serious low self-esteem indicators. High self-esteem is an essential building block that must be maintained in treating any kind of addiction.
When you don’t feel as if you deserve something (love, success, wealth, etc.) you will be plagued with defeatist emotions and actions which can often lead to addiction. How do you recover from this and other damaging self-conceptions? You start by re-building your self-esteem. Self-esteem is too often grouped into a goulash of touchy-feelies which make many recoil from as they experience self-help overload but it is truly a vitamin that must be present in our diet. Until the factor of self-esteem is addressed in treatment programs (whether the vice be gambling, sex, alcohol, drugs or food), the addiction will continue with as strong a success rate as ever.